Enlightenment Through Understanding

The govt. depends on the private sector, not the other way around

January 21, 2018

These tweets sound like something Bernie Sanders or Elizabeth Warren would say. Yeah, I understand it’s possible for both the far-left and far-right to find common ground, or what I called shared narratives if both sides are high IQ, but even I will admit sometimes it goes too far.

Given that such institutions are hopelessly in disrepair, collapse should be welcomed. Almost anything the public sector can do, the private sector can do faster and cheaper. Millions of people use Amazon because it’s cheap, convenient, and better than the alternatives. Shouldn’t Amazon’s shareholders and founders, such as Jeff Bezos, be rewarded for bringing about such an invaluable/important company into existence? Sorta a rhetorical question, yet capitalism is predicated on the belief that individuals, when they are allowed to compete, take risks, and keep the fruits of their labor, produce products and innovations that benefit society as a whole. Monetary compensation is one such incentive; other incentives include prestige and social status (which is why academics produce papers that are hard to comprehend and seldom read–not to impress the masses–but to boost their status among other like-minded academics). Because academia doesn’t have to compete and does not depend on generating profits or pleasing shareholders–but is instead funded by donors, tuition, and the government–it has the luxury of producing content that is impractical and or of no immediate and obvious value. There is possible value in this, indirectly, in the long-run, such as STEM, but capitalism is beneficial for things that are more practical, such as consumer goods. Also, where/how does the government get its funding to fund these universities, in the first place? That necessitates the need for a productive sector.

There won’t be a collapse. Techno-determinism/inevitability means it’s the destiny of such tech companies such as Google and Facebook to rule, like it or not. But also, look at America’s surging entitlement spending problem, as well as unfunded liabilities, and national debt. These mega-companies aren’t beholden to the good graces of the U.S. government; rather, it’s the other way around: America needs these companies to help fund the federal deficit; specifically the Treasury can sell bonds against future revenues to fund such deficit spending. If it weren’t for these mega-corporations and the revenues and prestige these companies provide/bestow, America would be like Brazil or Spain, which have high inflation, high borrowing costs, civil unrest, falling currencies, and lower standards of living. The U.S. government may be dumb, but not dumb enough to shut off the few remaining sources of economic productivity, innovation, and revenue generation in a sea of liberalism and social parasitism. As evidence of such dependency, that is also why the U.S. government relies heavily on contractors instead of building the stuff themselves. Same for the People’s Republic of China, which learned the hard way from the failure of Mao that market-communism does not work. China’s government toes a hard line with their symbolic reverence for Mao, but in practice are more laissez-faire. Same for Putin’s Russia. Putin, a billionaire, would not want to jeopardize his wealth and prestige by making the same mistakes as his Soviet predecessors.